Waterfront Homeowners Living on the Edge

Bill Gargiulo said he thought he had the right to build a retaining wall in front of his house on the West River south of Annapolis. But it turned out to be illegal, and Anne Arundel County officials are forcing him to remove it. "What we did was wrong, and we will correct it," he says. (By Dayna Smith For The Washington Post)

Most of the violations occur on a smaller scale -- in cases involving sidewalks, sheds or patios built too close to water by homeowners who said they didn't know they were doing anything wrong.

"When the men arrived, they said they had gotten all the permits," said Barbara Kowalski, who had to seek permission for a deck that contractors added to her home on Bodkin Creek in Pasadena. "And they waved an envelope at me -- 'Yeah, lady, yeah, lady, we got 'em.' And they did not."

On the West River, south of Annapolis, Bill Gargiulo said he thought he had the right to build a retaining wall in front of his house. But it turned out to be illegal, he said, and the county is forcing him to tear it down.

"What we did was wrong, and we will correct it," he said, probably with a party to celebrate the demolition. But Gargiulo said he was irked that Wagner, who built something much larger, got to keep his home. "What's fair for one should be fair for all."

One afternoon last week, environmental activist Bob Gallagher gave a boat tour of what he said were critical-area intrusions on the West River. There was Gargiulo's retaining wall, there a carport on another home, there a shed.

"You learn to look for yellow. It's the color of construction equipment," which is a sign of waterside construction, said Gallagher, whose is "keeper" of the West and Rhode rivers.

He said he hopes that O'Malley's bill will lead to tougher enforcement of the rules. "If you've never experienced criticism for having done it, you keep doing it."

Staff writer Lisa Rein and staff researcher Meg Smith contributed to this report.